


Gods and Monsters

by uchiha_s



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-22
Updated: 2014-12-22
Packaged: 2018-03-02 21:58:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2827472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uchiha_s/pseuds/uchiha_s
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-apocalypse AU. Contacting Voldemort is her first assignment, and one about which Granger is not thrilled. “Never forget who you are talking to, little girl.”  HG/LV, implied HG/SS.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gods and Monsters

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BrightneeBee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrightneeBee/gifts), [Tomione_Forum](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tomione_Forum/gifts).



> **Disclaimer:** This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by J.K. Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros. Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
> 
>  **Warnings:** dubcon, blood, violence, smut.
> 
>  **Author’s note:** This was inspired by a bunch of things. I don’t own any of them. Also, there is a line in here that is startlingly reminiscent of Twilight. I don’t own that, either, and you can lol at me for my lack of creativity if you like. 
> 
> For Bee, for the TomioneConvention Secret Santa 2014 fic exchange.

**Gods and Monsters**

 

 

 

She’s heard the rumors, so when Potter warns her to ‘suit up’ she does so with grim resignation.

 

“He’s not like the others, Granger. You’re going to have to play by his rules.” Potter pauses and exhales, his voice tinny, cracklingly distant. “Not that I’m not perfectly confident in your abilities to outfox anyone, but he can be a pain in the arse when he feels like it, and that’s not usually when it’s convenient for us.”

 

“Maybe I’m not the best person to send for this,” Granger suggests slowly, the transceiver wedged between her chin and shoulder as she zips up the front of her suit.

 

“Not exactly—but our options are a bit _thin on the ground_ right now.” This time it’s Snape speaking, his voice silken with amusement at her expense.

 

“Granger, just go and be on your best behavior,” Potter interrupts, before Snape’s comment can ignite an argument. “One last thing: _do not bargain with him._ You will lose.”

 

Over and out. Just like that, the communication line goes dead, and Granger is back to being totally alone in her flat. Even though the transceivers they use are disposable, she can’t stop herself from carefully wrapping the cord and placing it on the windowsill.

 

It’s hot in her flat, especially now that she’s got her suit on. Granger sets her hands on the sill and looks out. She’s on the thirty-first floor, and where she should see the tops of smaller buildings, and traffic, and cars, and people on sidewalks, she instead sees a world of glittering, endless blue.

 

Normally she would have been more combative—she usually never lets Potter talk to her like that—but this assignment gives her pause. There is a tightening in her gut as she surveys the view before her, and spots, in the distance, the top of a green building jutting out from the water, partially masked by a makeshift sailboat docked on the roof of a building whose roof is leaning into the water. Even from here, she can hear the men laughing; they’re drinking. Gulls perch on the masts of the sails and the corners of the buildings.

 

Hidden beyond this moment of day-to-day life is Voldemort, caged in that green building in the distance.

 

No time to waste—Granger slides on her boots, grabs her mask and tank, and leaves her flat. She thinks again of Snape’s voice as she trundles along a set of boards laid out, her boots thumping along the unsteady, sodden wood, towards her own craft.

 

She’s never seen Snape in person. She’s heard descriptions of what he looks like—tall; dark hair; clever but haunted dark eyes—but she feels as though she knows him better than herself, after all these years of communication. Every time he cuts off the line, lately, she is left with a feeling of desperation. The command in his voice curls her toes, makes her mind go to dark places.

 

She doesn’t want feelings for anybody, but she can’t help it.

 

Still, thoughts of Snape are banished as she hops in her craft and is soon submerged. Her tank attachments are a little faulty, so the air quality isn’t perfect, but it’s a short trip. She weaves around submerged buildings in a world of dark, murky green, towards her target. The trip is too short—she wants more time before meeting Voldemort. Somehow, in spite of being the most prepared person on their team, she feels ill-prepared.

 

He—Voldemort—made it clear that he’s not on anybody’s side but his own. With enough firepower to ruin their little base alone, he’s best kept close at all times, but just how close is a matter of strategy that is, frankly, beyond them, even Weasley. Granger’s strength is research and planning, not this on-the-fly nonsense that Potter and Weasley generally resort to. She’s more inclined to admire Snape’s careful planning, but he’s never shown any inclination to share his plans with _her._

 

Contacting Voldemort wasn’t in the plan, so the option hasn’t been fully explored. Even though Potter has made it clear that there is no further research to be done on Voldemort – because it isn’t there—Granger can’t help but lack faith in this sentiment. Her own flat is packed to bursting with books, with stacks of notes. In the little spare free time she’s had, she’s managed to do some research on Voldemort, but there simply hasn’t been enough _time._ He was once the brightest and most valuable scholar at the Ministry, but that was a long time ago. In spite of his identity, his work is more compelling than most—she can’t help but pore over his research, aching for a world that once was so sanguine, so civilized, so _bursting_ with thought.

 

All too soon, her journey is over, and her craft breaches the water’s surface with a _hiss_ as the glass dome pops open. It’s hot inside the craft and grows stuffy quickly. Relieved, Granger shakes off the mask as she bobs along with the whitecaps in her craft, staring up at the building before her. This building was thirty-six stories, so it’s a bit taller than the others peeking out of the water nearby. Atop it, she can see hurricane fencing at the perimeter, with spiraling, rusting barbed wire crowning it. In the too-bright sunlight, an impossibly tall, slim figure is silhouetted. The hairs on the back of her neck prickle as she watches the head tilt, looking down at her for a moment. Then he turns and disappears out of view.

 

Voldemort is a code name, meant to be used in secret originally, but now it has surpassed the man’s real name in usage, so that now, his real name—whatever that might be—would be a better code name. Voldemort is infamous, but believed to be mostly a moot threat now that Grindelwald has trapped him in this makeshift tower, his supplies and communications generally limited to periodic food and water drops from helicopters.

 

He’s not technically imprisoned, but he’s not free, either.

 

She’s not supposed to be contacting him, but on the other hand, there’s nothing to stop her. In this post-government world, there is no meaningful way of enforcing any laws, any rights; and civilization is lost to free will and the savagery of humanity, tempered and humbled only in the face of true nature.

 

There is a makeshift dock out of a large window; the building is an art-deco style and must have once been magnificent. Boards float and bob with the tide, buoyed by large orange spherical buoys stained, faded, and covered in algae. A long pole juts from the wall; Granger uses this to dock her craft, which is fortunately light enough to not be in danger of ripping the flimsy dock out of the wall.

 

On unsteady feet, she clambers out of her craft and onto the floating boards; even after almost a lifetime of this life, she still hasn’t got her sealegs, and probably never will. She’s sweaty from being in the craft, and thirsty, but she’s got to ignore that for now. She rises to her feet, brushing herself off, and gives the building one more appraisal before clambering inside the long window.

 

She is grateful for her boots because she lands with a glassy crunch on the shattered remnants of the window. Bits of sunlight reveal the glass is brightly colored; it must have once been a gorgeous stained-glass window. The light hits the fragments, sending flickers of light— _Tinkerbells,_ her mum used to call them—flaring out along the dirty once-marble floor. The bits of glass are scattered by the force of her jump and roll and jump along the floor, hitting little puddles of water with metallic _plinks_.

 

The room is high-ceilinged; up above, in what must have once been glorious brass coffers, thin wiring is roped and taped, serpentine, along each coffer. It’s a makeshift job, like everything else in her life, but it’s well-done, she can see that much. A clench of fear in the pit of her belly eliminates her awe of the lost beauty of this room.

 

Voldemort is clearly prepared for her, but where is he?

 

“H-hello,” Granger stammers, her voice catching. Her voice bounces off the walls, off the water. Potter has contacted Voldemort, warning him of her arrival, but does it matter? _He sent you because he knows you can do it,_ she reminds herself, but it does little to steel her courage. She’s not one for confrontation; she’d rather be buried in research.

 

 _You have no choice. They_ need _you,_ she tries this time, and it does something for her bravery. She feels more solid. She draws herself up. “Hello,” she calls again, her voice stronger, louder. “This is Granger from Phoenix.”

 

No response. She falters and, with a sigh, picks her way along the room, towards the long, narrow doors, which are decaying and falling off their hinges.

 

She walks a long hall, ears pricked, muscles coiled, waiting for a sign—any sign—of Voldemort. She reaches the end of the hall and comes to a once-brass grated lift. The lift box has been pulled open, revealing its electronic guts, and she can see that the wiring here has been re-done. The face and console hang out against the wall, attached only by the old, probably useless wiring.

 

She picks up the console and, hesitating, presses the ‘up’ button. With a groan, the grate slides, allowing her into the lift. From somewhere there is a faint, fading, staticky melody being piped in. Ruefully she finds herself smiling—old lift music—a thing from her youth that she had forgotten.

 

The grate slides in again, trapping her. Now there’s no escape—with a guttural, creaking shriek of gears and pulleys, the view of the long hall slowly disappears as she rises up. Its instability recalls a distant memory from her youth: amusement park rides. She reaches the top floor lost in a haze of memories of carnival music, laughter, bright lights winking in balmy summer air.

 

The stand-in windows lining the walls let in the intense bleached sunlight, setting the air, heavy with dust particles, aglow. It gives the room a mist-like quality, enshrouding everything within. Granger’s skin tingles with fear. This is not what she signed up to do; this is not what she _wants_ to do.

 

But it must be done.

 

“Voldemort?”

 

Even the name itself sends a jolt of panic through her. She steps off the lift, feeling like she has an ever-swelling balloon inside her.

 

“Granger. From Phoenix.”

 

The voice is velvety soft; diaphanous; _ice._ In a world where everything seems to be melting, this voice is glacial; this voice is like the first frost over the tangled moors that painted the backdrop of a long-forgotten youth.

 

“Show yourself.” She imitates Harry’s forceful, nervy tone, but it is like a child’s poorly-sewn costume on her. She reaches to her hip holster—never before worn—and, after a moment’s fumbling, places her hand on her gun.

 

“Do you even know how to use that?”

 

Out of the shadows comes a lithe, svelte silhouette—the one that had been peering down at her. Through the heavy dust, he steps into the sunlight, now set aglow by it.

 

He is perhaps forty, forty-five at most, though his skin is smooth as marble and just as white. His age is betrayed by the sharpness of his cheekbones and jawline, a receding hairline, and the streaks of grey at his temples in his otherwise jet-black hair. He has pale lips, dark eyes, and arched, clever brows. Once upon a time, he was a devastatingly handsome man; she can see that and it makes her belly twist. It hangs about him now like a shadow, like a vapor, leaving his appearance almost blurred. Now the narrows of his eyes curve in a serpentine, feral way; there is a ruby to the blacks of his eyes that makes her take a step back.

 

“Of course I do, and I’m not afraid to if I have to,” she finally says, after the shock of his appearance begins to wear off. He’s taller than her, significantly. She draws in a deep breath. “You already know why I’m here.”

 

“I admit I do, though I also must admit I’m hurt that Potter himself wasn’t sent—but I suppose that would be a strategic move on Severus’ part,” muses Voldemort as he steps further into the light. He’s clothed in simple, black utilitarian clothes that fit him impeccably.

 

Hermione’s mouth goes dry at his words but she does not betray her hand by demanding how he knows about _Severus._

 

He moves with the grace of a ghost. He circles her, appraising her, and when he comes to face her again, there is amusement haunting his smooth pale lips. He arches a clever brow at her once more. “Mm, what _has_ Potter sent me?”

 

“What? You mean, who,” she corrects, her face flaming. She reaches for her holster once more, in an attempt to nonverbally threaten him, but he smirks as his gaze flicks to her holster, then to her face once more. “We don’t have a choice,” she blusters, straightening her back, whilst wishing her blushing would quit. “I’m here as a representative of Phoenix. We need your help.”

 

Voldemort throws back his head and lets out a silky, sensuous laugh, before turning and stalking off. He gestures without looking back for her to follow, and, furiously, she trods after him.

 

“Of course you do,” he muses, still not looking back at her. “I suppose Potter has finally accepted that he can’t face Gellert now that his precious Dumbledore is cold and dead—or, should I say, waterlogged and floating and bloated in the Atlantic somewhere, with no more dignity than a common piece of algae.”

 

“How dare you—“ she begins hotly, but it happens in an instant: she feels something graze her cheek, as her warm brown eyes meet his of deepest ruby; something ruffles her hair; then something warm and sticky is leaking down her cheek as the knife hits the wall behind her with a splintering, coppery thud that reverberates; she cannot see the knife in the wall but she can hear it trembling with the force of impact. She cannot breathe. Where did the knife come from? She never saw him hold one, or even reach for it—and then, had it been just a shade to her right, it would be lodged in her face, possibly in her eye, in this moment.

 

Their gazes are locked. She feels held in place by his power alone.

 

“Never forget who you are talking to, little girl.”

 

She is too rooted to the ground with fear to even bring herself to reach up, to wipe away the blood dribbling down her cheek. The meager light casts shadows in the hollows of his cheeks, and he is at once hideous and lovely. A lock of dark hair falls across his white forehead, and it is the only sign that he has moved at all.

 

His muscles uncoil; he relaxes. He fixes her with a smirk. “Now, tell me—what was it you wanted?”

 

She’s read about psychopaths; she’s read about _him_. She knows about his crimes, she knows what he’s done to people, to his victims. Somehow she thought she was immune, thought she would be above all that. Somehow she imagined this would be a simple meeting of negotiations. _Just be on your best behavior, Granger._

 

She had been so stupid.

 

“We need to infiltrate Grindelwald’s headquarters,” she begins, her voice trembling uncontrollably. She might be having a heart attack. The world is spinning but Voldemort remains still, in the calm eye of her current visual storm. “Only you know the system…” she can’t finish her sentence. The blood has trickled down her cheek and pools in the corner of her mouth, and she can taste it.

 

Her mind flashes images of pigs strung up to be butchered; she is about to fall prey to the most dangerous man in the world.

 

“…Because it was once mine,” he finishes for her, approaching her again. His cold hand rests along her jaw, tilts her face up to his. His thumb hovers over the cut he has made on her cheek. This close, she can scent his skin. He smells like fire. His thumb presses uncomfortably into the cut. His gaze unravels her as it travels over her cheek, examining the cut.

 

He lets go, looking thoughtful as he turns away. “Yes, it was once mine, until Dumbledore himself drove me out. No matter, I never intended to stay there very long.”

 

He cannot admit to the truth: like everyone else, the radiation is killing him. He is sick, he will die soon, and his sickness has sapped him of the strength he needed to protect himself. He looks back at her, over his svelte shoulder. “And what will you give me, little girl, if I do help?”

 

 _Do not bargain with him. You will lose._ Potter has been perfectly clear on this. And yet… her clever mind is clicking into action, now that the immediate threat has (somewhat) receded. She licks her lips, swaying with the heady sensation of regaining her breath.

 

“You obviously want something,” she prompts, nodding to him. His lips curve as he settles back into the chair behind him. Dozens of monitors cover the wall behind him; they display every nook and cranny of the building that he can possibly survey. Jumbled together, draped with wires, they make up the eerie throne at which he sits now, leisurely surveying her.

 

“You think you’ve gained the upper hand, I see,” he remarks. “Potter told you not to bargain with me—even mice know to fear hawks—and you think you know better.”

 

He pauses, cocking his head to the side as he watches her through eyes narrowed into shrewd crescents. “You think you’re the clever one. Deep down, you think you know better even than Severus.”

 

There have always been rumors that Voldemort and Snape knew each other, _back then._ Before the world filled with water. The instinctual familiarity with which Voldemort refers to Snape, the man she has only listened to, never met in person, only confirms that. “You’ve read all the books on me, haven’t you? This is your first mission, and you’re finding you can’t learn courage from books.”

 

He is slicing into her with the dramatic precision of a practiced surgeon, his words glimmering darkly like blades and just as sharp. “But, I’ve been so rude,” he says, his tone changing—suddenly he sounds normal, polite, _friendly._ Like someone she might know, someone she might trust. He waves a pale, elegant hand to a sunken-in sofa. “Please, sit down, Hermione Granger.”

 

“Th-thank you,” she stammers. She knows it would be foolish to resist, so she obediently sits on the sofa. It is damp. Fabric is unwise in this new world.

 

“Now, tell me—how does it feel to know Potter and Severus have sent you on a suicide mission?” He rests his chin on his hand, crosses his legs—he looks like a friendly therapist, or perhaps an engaged party host. “I warned them, very specifically, that if they did not cooperate with the terms which I stipulated on communication between us, that they would pay the price.”

 

_Did he?_

 

Her last shreds of confidence are bottoming out.

 

_Do they expect me to die today?_

 

She thinks of her flat—a place she’s hated all of her adult life, all of the time she’s occupied it, hated it for how it symbolizes the end of everything she knew—and suddenly, she wants nothing more than to be there, safe with her books, their pages forever slightly damp; safe from Voldemort, his existence a mere shadow on the landscape of her life.

 

She runs her fingers over the sodden fabric, trying to ground herself in their threads.

 

“I don’t—I don’t believe you,” she says hoarsely. “You’re lying to uproot my confidence, to turn me against them.” She blinks, lets herself picture Harry, whose very life is a symbol of their rebellion, of all of the things she stands for. “We need your help, Voldemort. We never—“ she falters, trying to piece her words together, “—we never intended to end up on the same side, but here we are. We can either work together towards our common goal, or work separately. Phoenix proposes that we work together.”

 

“Very good,” he muses, still watching her, his pupils boring into hers, “and you did that even without looking off your notecards. Very good indeed.” He rises from his chair abruptly. “You may leave. I will send Potter my answer separately.”

 

The dismissal is shocking. No death? No torture? She was so certain she was about to die. She hesitates, watching his back.

 

She rises. In silence, she leaves him.

 

\--

 

“You survived,” Sirius greets hoarsely, as Hermione steps off the dock and into Phoenix headquarters. His shock sends a tingle of horror down her spine. _Now tell me, how does it feel to know Severus and Potter have sent you on a suicide mission?_

 

“I just went to meet him.” Her tone is flat, betrays none of the betrayal or defensiveness she feels. Sirius, a man she’s long trusted, seen as a father figure, fixes her with a look of concern now. He grips her upper arms, and she can’t pry herself from him. She wants to go inside, wants to find evidence in her dealings with Harry against Voldemort’s words.

 

She wants proof that she isn’t disposable to Phoenix, to Harry, _to Snape._

 

“Granger, what did he say?” His voice is hard now. Hermione wriggles away from him.

 

“He was definitely strange,” she says acidly. “But I’m fine. We discussed Phoenix’s proposition. Now, if you don’t mind, my suit is waterlogged and I’d like something to eat.”

 

He lets go, but he doesn’t look away. She can feel his gaze burning into her back as she stalks down the dock, and ducks into the headquarters.

 

It’s dark and windowless here. Several tables are clustered under lights; groups of rebels crowd at the tables. She can smell the tinny, metallic scent of tinned food. Their rations are growing smaller every day, and they can’t survive on the fish they find in the ocean.

 

The fish are as sick as they are.

 

“Granger.” Potter and Weasley explode out of another door, flanked by Weasley’s younger sister, Ginny, and Longbottom. “Come on.”

 

Once upon a time, Harry Potter was an athletic but quiet boy, engaging and empathic, that she knew. Now he’s a rebel leader; he is a man. She follows his lean form through another door, into the interrogation room. She wishes Longbottom or Weasley or even Ginny could come too, but she finds herself alone with Harry. Like everything else in their world, their friendship has melted; grown bloated and unrecognizable; is dying of radiation.

 

He leans his hip against a low table in the interrogation room, crosses his arms, and looks at his feet.

 

“Yes, I survived,” she says dryly. Her blood is burning.

 

“Well, yeah.” He flashes a smile at her. “Knew you would.”

 

Why doesn’t she believe him?

 

Why _can’t_ she?

 

“He—he says he’ll send his answer to you.” Her voice catches. “He…” she thinks back on the interaction, “…seems like he was once very friendly with Snape.”

 

“Well, Snape was his right hand man.” Harry lets this bomb drop and explode, shattering her reality. “I’m not up to date on how often they see each other at this point, though. Being that Voldemort is under constant surveillance by Grindelwald, it’s not like it’s easy for him to pop on by.”

 

“Good to know,” she snarks. Her face is flaming again. “Well, that’s all I’ve got to report. If you don’t have anything else for me, then, I’m going to get dinner.”

 

There is a long silence as they both reflect on all they’ve lost. She leaves.

 

The kitchens are really simply where food is untinned and heated and apportioned. They’re cramped and busy and sweaty and loud; it’s easy for Hermione to slip through them, unnoticed, and to snag a tin of food on her way before slinking out the back door, onto the back docks. A guard, Hagrid, keeps watch over the back dock of the headquarters, but he’s asleep now, as usual. The only light shines on the end of the dock, and Hermione stands there, watching it, feeling the dock sway with the tide.

 

Harry considers her dispensable; she almost died today; Snape was once working for Voldemort.

 

She is adrift.

 

She scales the wall, avoiding the edge of the dock, as she walks along it, further into darkness. She sits on the planks, avoiding dipping her feet into the water, and feels the seat of her suit get wet from the wet planks as she unpeels the lid of the tin and eats with her fingers with as much dignity as possible. There’s a lump in her throat which she can’t swallow past.

 

She creakily gets to her feet; she gathers her tin, with a sigh preparing to return to the din of the kitchen. And then—“Granger.”

 

Her airways are constricted; she is held in place by strong arms; there is a blade at her throat. She knows this voice, but she can’t seem to think—“One move, one noise, and you will be dead.”

 

It’s Snape.

 

Goosebumps prickle along her skin as she realizes she is locked in a chokehold by the only man who has been capable of eliciting feelings more than lukewarm from her in well over fifteen years, and he’s threatening to murder her.

 

She swallows and the blade presses further into her skin. The odd realization—seemingly random—that neither Harry nor Sirius noticed the cut on her cheek hits her now. Snape loosens his hold; the blade is not so tight on her skin. She gasps greedily for breath. “Follow. Do not speak. Do not run.”

 

She nods though she can’t see, and feels a strong hand latch round her wrist, pulling her further along the docks. In her surprise, the tin drops to the planks, then rolls off into the ocean. But she’s being pulled along into darkness, and then she drops into the water after him blindly.

 

\--

 

“She’s coming to.”

 

Her vision is blurred and she’s cold. Her head is throbbing. Hermione lets out a groan and lifts her head up, barely capable of it. A swimming vision of a tall silhouette, his face obscured by a gas mask, wavers before her eyes shut again and her head drops back onto the pillow. There’s something over her mouth and she reaches up blindly; she wants to take it off, but she can’t. “Ah ah, I wouldn’t do that,” chides a sensuous baritone, far warmer yet far more eerie to her than Snape’s cold, flat voice. “Unless, of course, you’re fond of inhaling toxic air.”

 

She wants to tell him that all air is toxic, that he should keep up with the news—the air’s been toxic _since the entire planet flooded_ —but she can’t find the strength.

 

“Get up, Granger.” Snape is ordering her to move. The shameful part of her, dark and hidden under all the constructs she’s applied to herself throughout her life, wants nothing more than to obey, but it’s dark and hidden for a reason, and she lies still.

 

“She thinks she’s proving something by disobeying,” Voldemort observes. She can feel his presence approach her, though she keeps her eyes shut tight. “You’ve done well this time, Severus,” he murmurs more appreciatively now.

 

“I aim to serve, my lord.” There is a hint of humor in Snape’s otherwise flat voice. He’s making a reference, an inside joke. She hears Voldemort laugh. His voice recalls the movie stars from black and white films; he sounds (and once looked) like a leading man in a pre-war romance film.

 

“You may leave us.”

 

“Yes, my lord.”

 

A door shuts. Snape is gone.

 

She opens her eyes.

 

Voldemort stands over her, his face hidden by the gas mask. It is dark here.

 

“Where are we?” she rasps. She’s thirsty and the tin of food feels like ages ago.

 

“Make a guess. You’re a clever girl, aren’t you?”

 

She tries to sit up once more, and her muscles are weak.

 

“We’re not in your building,” she observes slowly, looking round. A light clicks on—Voldemort’s got a flashlight, and now he flicks it over various corners of the room almost playfully. The circle of light flashes on crown molding; hooks and chains. Her stomach turns.

 

“We’re in the Ministry, where you murdered Albus Dumbledore.” Her voice is strangely calm, in stark contrast to her ever-rising hysteria.

 

The light flicks off.

 

“Precisely.”

 

He pauses. “I’m impressed, little Hermione Granger.”

 

He is slightly muffled by the gas mask; it takes away any remaining qualities of humanity that he might have appeared to possess. He is a monstrous god.

 

“Why am I here?”

 

He circles the bed she’s on.

 

“Take another guess.”

 

She looks round again, but it’s too dark to see now. She can feel him mere inches away from her, but she can’t see him now; he’s moved further into the darkness.

 

“You want me to study something for you.”

 

“You asked me what I wanted in return,” he begins. She hears him moving; his footsteps are wet. “As clever as you are, Potter happened to be right, for once—bargaining with me is always foolish on your part. Now, I uphold my end of the bargain: I will provide Phoenix with aid. The question is, will you uphold yours?”

 

He’s too close; he is inches from her ear. Her blood sings with his proximity as she burns with shame.

 

“You never stipulated my end of the agreement,” she says, her voice shaking but solid enough. “We never signed or shook on it.”

 

“Oh, is that how we make bargains these days?” His voice is silky soft.

 

“Yes.” She nods.

 

“I think,” he begins softly, “the lion never bargains with the lamb.”

 

She swallows.

 

“Noted.”

 

“I need you to decode something for me.” His tone changes, he’s pacing again. “You will do this under my supervision, without notice to Potter or any other operatives of Phoenix.”

 

“Except Snape,” Hermione interjects. She hears Voldemort laugh again.

 

“No longer feeling so impressed—Snape was never part of Phoenix, you foolish little girl.”

 

“He was your right-hand man.”

 

“He _is_ my right-hand man.”

 

Voldemort pauses in his pacing. She can barely detect his slim outline. She waits. One heartbeat. Then two.

 

She explodes off the bed; the thin ropes holding her into place are ripped from the bed as they cut into her skin. Blinding pain burns through her but she ignores it as she dashes towards what she hopes is a door. Voldemort does nothing but watches as she frantically claws at the walls, gasping and heaving for breath through her gas mask. She screams through her teeth in frustration when she realizes that she will not be leaving this room unless Voldemort so desires it.

 

She turns to look back at him. He flicks the flashlight on and shines it directly in her eyes as he leisurely approaches her. “Giving up so soon?” he pouts.

 

 _He’ll kill me._ She has disobeyed and he will kill her. Her back is against the wall, and now he is invading her personal space as his long, pianist fingers grip her jaw and tilt her head to force her to look at him. She can only see her mask reflected in the plastic eye covers of his.

 

He presses his body against hers. She struggles to breathe but she can’t move. “Did you really think I’d neglect to lock the door?” he breathes.

 

“No, but it was worth a try,” she whimpers. His gloved fingers dig harder into her jaw as heat rushes to her core.

 

_Now tell me, how does it feel to know Severus and Potter have sent you on a suicide mission?_

 

He has pinned her to the wall. His knee is planted between her legs. He’s strong, stronger than she’d expect a dying man to be. She waits, then makes a last break for it, struggling against him. He drops the flashlight and it hits the flooded floor with a wet _kerplunk_ and rolls away, out of reach, as they gasp for breath through their masks and struggle for dominance.

 

He overpowers her, grips her hair, and pulls, and she lets out a cry of pain. She plants her hands against his hard chest, attempting to push him away, and he grasps her wrists and pins her arms back against the wall. Their torsos crush against each other now as he struggles to keep her pinned down.

 

The friction is unbearable and humiliating as the atmosphere changes. Her struggling relents as the friction, for one haunting, blazing moment, is very intentional. He possesses her entirely in this moment. She wants nothing more than to close her eyes and submit to the friction, but her mind is screaming at her to fight harder, to remember who she is and what she stands for— _Now tell me, how does it feel to know Severus and Potter have sent you on a suicide mission?_

 

And then she stops struggling as her desire crashes into her. This is the man who once ruled the world; in this moment she knows this is the man who will rule the world again. This is the man who was once the Ministry’s most brilliant scholar; how much of his research has she pored over, horrified by how his writing enthralls her?

 

And then his fingers are pulling down the zipper of her wetsuit, exposing her bare skin to the damp, humid air, as her fingers dig into his shoulders in desperation. His hand is pushing down her wetsuit as his other finds the juncture between her legs, finds the heat there, and draws it out of her like song, his palm grinding against her cunt as her nails cut into his skin through the thin cloth of his shirt.

 

His gas mask is pushed aside as his mouth trails hotly along her skin, over her breasts, and she thinks faintly, _he’ll die,_ and then, more faint than the last, _we all will._

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
